


and sat him doon at her bed feet

by takiki16



Category: Leverage
Genre: Alternate Universe - Shapeshifters, F/M, M/M, Multi, OT3, Selkies, selkies are known
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-24
Updated: 2018-05-24
Packaged: 2019-05-13 04:46:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,875
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14742261
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/takiki16/pseuds/takiki16
Summary: Love and commitment for three different people, in three different ways.  Three unconnected ficlets about each of the Leverage OT3 being a selkie.





	and sat him doon at her bed feet

**Author's Note:**

> many thanks to redbrunja for the beta review!

If you had something, then it could be stolen.  If it was a valuable something, then eventually someone would steal it.  If there were a hundred stories going back a thousand years about how  _your thing_ was the  _best thing ever_  that could possibly be stolen, and that you would have to work for the person who stole it forever, then it was practically a guarantee.  So she would just have to learn how to steal from everyone else  _first_.  

Parker ditched every single human family placement that Child Services tried to put her with.  She learned to steal for food, then to boost cars for money.  Archie happened, and he taught her about vaults and lasers and motion detectors and combination locks.  She learned all the ways that systems could be built, then broken.  She rotated her pelt through a web of secret fortified hiding places, concealed so cleverly that no one would ever find them.  And if anyone ever did, then she would steal her pelt back. Because no one could watch a selkie wife every minute of every day.  No one could steal from the best thief in the world.  

The bizarre thing about Alec Hardison, though, was that he didn’t even try.  

Alec Hardison, master hacker extraordinaire, had big hands and a goofy smile.  He had an easy laugh and a fearlessly open heart and an endless mental encyclopedia of pop culture queued up at a moment’s notice.  He didn’t ask about her pelt, not once, not even when the entire team knew she was a selkie.  He talked about  _pretzels_  and snarked at Eliot, and Parker looked and looked and realized one day that this must be what love  _feels_  like, this giant, needy thing that fluttered whenever Hardison pressed his shoulder against hers.

A hundred stories going back a thousand years.  Even if you couldn't find the words, love always meant a certain thing. And she knew that she was maybe skipping part of the story, but all of them ended up the same way.  

Alec is looking at her now,  with the face that she has started calling his  _pretzel_  face.  It’s part of the reason why she loves him so much, why she can’t put  _words_ to it.  Which is why her pelt is in her lap, because according to the old story it should be enough, better than words.  A selkie wife was something everyone wanted, after all.  

She just...cant.  She can’t.  Make her hands. Move.  That’s all.  

“It’s okay, mama.”  Hardison takes her hand -  _not her pelt_  - and moves to sit by her.  Pretzel face is on full power, and she loves him so, so much.  “Why don’t you just hold onto that for me?”

The pelt eventually ends up in another secret, secret box owned by Leverage, Inc.  Hardison writes a program that he swears up and down will fry anyone but the three of them who dare to touch it.  Eliot promises that if anyone ever tried to take it, he would hunt them down.  

Her pelt is her own.  Her pelt is theirs.  She steals drawers and drawers full of Eliot’s clothes, wraps herself in Hardison’s big oversized hoodies with the brightly colored spandex people on them, and she is loved.  

 

* * *

 

Hardison tried to give his pelt away to his Nana when he was thirteen years old.  

He was a  _teenager_ , wise in the ways of the  _technology era_ , and while he knew that he wasn’t gonna be anyone’s husband yet, it didn’t mean he couldn’t stick by his Nana.  He could stay with her forever, wait for his growth spurt, help her out when her arthritis hurt real bad.  He could invent a robot to do all the dish washing and all the cleaning. Hack the IRS so Nana would get infinite money.  And, most importantly, no one would ever take Alec away from her, never not ever.  

Nana wouldn’t take the pelt.  She sat him down and had a long talk with him about  _love_  and  _relationships_  and not giving yourself entirely away to people, and that this didn’t mean she was going to send him away or let anyone take him because she loved him and he was a good boy. Even if he couldn’t keep his head on straight for long enough to leave her dishwasher alone. 

Hardison never did get around to building Nana her own personal housecleaning robot.  But a different bank paid her medical bills for every doctor’s visit, and Nana’s favorite shows always got recorded. His pelt lived in a box under the bed that Nana said would always be there for him, any time he needed a home. Sometimes, when the winter cold got really bad and Nana’s joints ached, being wrapped up in a warm selkie pelt was the only thing that would help even a little bit. She always fussed at him for doing it, told him that this didn’t mean she was taking away his second skin, that he still didn’t have his head on straight.  Hardison just smiled, and tucked the edges in tighter.  He knew what she meant.  He knew what he meant, too. 

Eliot and Parker are nowhere near as easy.  And they are a whole different breed of stubborn.  

Parker is shivering.  Her lips are blue, and not just Vegas Wake-up Call lipstick blue, either.  Blue as in, “I just jumped into the cold-ass harbor in the middle of January because the mark chucked the box full of our client’s crucial rock samples overboard.” 

Eliot is shivering too.  In a “I jumped into the harbor after Parker because it turns out that Parker + climbing gear + rock samples is too heavy for just Parker to pull up because I’m a big goddamn hero.”  He looks like a tiny, angry, soaking wet cat.  Hardison knows that his hair is going to be twice as big as normal when it starts floofing back up. It’s adorable.

Which said adorableness does not prevent Eliot from being his usual difficult self when Hardison is trying to wrap his pelt around them both.

“Dammit, Hardison!  I’m not taking your pelt!”  

“It’s not about  _taking_ , man, don’t you ever listen to me?”  Hardison tucks the other end of the pelt around Parker’s shoulder.  “It’s about me  _wanting._ See the difference there?”

“You  _wanted_ to drink three straight liters of high fructose corn syrup the other day!”  Eliot retorts.  “You want a lot of stupid things.” 

Hardison raises an eyebrow.  “You calling the three of us stupid?  Cuz I am an actual certified genius, baby, and that was  _not_  what you were saying the other night.”  

Eliot actually manages to blush a little bit, which is a sign that the pelt is working on a couple of different levels.  Hardison gives himself a mental high-five.  

“We don’t want to steal anything from you, Hardison,” Parker says in a small voice.  “You don’t run cons on your team.”

“You ain’t stealing anything from me!” Hardison throws his hands up, exasperated.  Parker scrambles to keep the pelt from falling down.  "I  _want_  you to have this!  And I mean, if you weren’t gonna let the actual  _marine qualified_ member of the team go diving into the ocean...”

“You aren’t taking the pelt out for jobs,” grumbles Parker, pulling the pelt closer around her and snuggling into Eliot’s shoulder.  “You should keep it somewhere safe.”

“And who says that I’m not doing just that, huh?”  Hardison drapes himself around Eliot and Parker, snaking an arm around each of them (goddamn does he love being the tallest sometimes) and pressing a kiss to Parker’s frozen cheek.  “I don’t know about you two, but I feel pretty safe right now.”  

 

* * *

 

The thing is, Eliot has given his pelt away before.  Has had it stolen before - more than once, even.  His pelt is full of wear and tear - a lifetime of scars and careless handling by his own hands, by the hands of others.  Eliot isn’t a stranger to being owned. Damien Moreau had draped the grey sealskin over the foot of his bed, a pointed remark as to where Eliot belonged.  It had taken oceans of blood for Eliot to steal it back. 

It isn’t a hard decision, to give Hardison and Parker his pelt.  Eliot has known for a while that he is theirs for life, that he loves them, that their hands will be by far the best that have ever touched it.  It’s not like he doesn’t already do all the cooking and cleaning anyway. Not like it  _changes_  anything.

He just doesn’t want to make a big  _thing_ about it, dammit.  

“What the hell is this?!”

Eliot is whisking eggs.   “What the hell is what?”

“This!”  Hardison holds up the pelt. 

“It’s a pelt.  And don’t pretend you don’t know what it is, or what you’re supposed to do with it.”   The eggs are a fine froth, but he keeps going.  Maybe he’ll make a meringue. By hand.  

“I don’t!  I mean, I know what it is, but I have no idea...is it  _yours?”_

_“_ Of course it’s mine!  You think I’d haul someone else’s around?”  

“Eliot’s giving us his pelt?”  Parker comes out of the room behind Hardison.  “Did someone try to steal it?”

“He  _left it_  in the  _closet_ , woman!  Like it was a cheap prom suit!  You just know there’s gonna be some kinda special fur-eating Oregon moths -” 

“DammitHardison!” Eliot slams the bowl down on the counter and turns around.  “You guys are supposed to take the pelt and hide it somewhere I can’t...somewhere I won’t look for it!  Don’t you know anything?”

Hardison flails.  “I’m not just gonna take your pelt!  What do I look like, some fisherman in the medieval times?”

“It’s not a  _medieval_  thing, it’s something that selkies - “

“Oh, I’m sorry, I didn’t realize that my  _knowledge_ of  _history_  is the issue here when we’re talking about you  _handing over_ your _life_  - “

“ - can’t you just take the damn pelt and stop making everything so - “

“ - could have dropped it on my dirty laundry, do you even  _realize - “_

_“-_ it’s not a big deal, you just need to - “

“Do you WANT to give this to us?!” Parker shouts

"YES!”

The kitchen is silent.  Both of them are staring at him like he’s just said something remarkable, something totally new that they’ve never heard before, and it’s just so  _stupid_ and  _frustrating_  because how can they not know?  How can they not know, that he would die for them, that he would  _live_  for them, that he wants to do nothing more for the rest of his life than take bullets for them and have bickering sessions with Hardison and put chocolate chips in Parker’s pancakes and  _want_  them so deeply it could fill the ocean?  

“Damn,” says Hardison weakly.

And then he is kissing Eliot.  And then Parker is kissing Eliot.  And then his old worn pelt is squeezed between the three of them, and the bowl of eggs gets tipped over the edge of the sink, and all three of them end up messy and sweaty and gross, but it’s more than okay because he’s theirs, and they are his, and at last they all know it.  

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by this post on tumblr: http://takiki16.tumblr.com/post/171150239971/geekybibliophile-swimthroughthefires
> 
> The title comes from Alison McMorland's version of The Great Silkie of Sule Skerry, a traditional folk song from the Orkney Islands about a woman and a selkie. The plot of the song itself is very sad and has nothing to do with my fluffy Leverage bunnies, but I liked McMorland's lyrics:
> 
> It happened on a certain day  
> When this fair maid lay fast asleep  
> That in cam a grey silkie  
> And sat him doon at her bed feet.
> 
> Saying, “Awak' awak' ma fair pretty maid  
> For oh how sound as thou dost sleep,  
> I'll tell thee whaur yer bain's faither is  
> He's lyin' close at your bed feet.”


End file.
